Talk:A Voice for Men

Statistics to support neutrality of text

I can't say I'm convinced Wikipedia will care to be netural, but in the final paragraph of this article, the dispute with SPLC is listed, and the commentary provides incorrect information by quoting SPLC alleging only 2%-8% of sexual assaults are false (which is still ridiculously high considering that the criminal justice system operates on a premise it is better to let a guilty man free than for one innocent person to be convicted of something they didn't do). Here is an infographic from StatsCanada, award-winning organization and world leader for accuracy, in a country that is perhaps the most progressive in the whole world, and who stopped reporting this statistic 2004-2016 due to pressure from feminist lobbies, and has created a new metric that reports unfounded allegations only in cases where the "police officers investigated the allegation and proved it could not have been true." Hope you read that right. In other words, they are not to count the instances where the charge was simply dropped for lack of evidence, or where the alleged victim dropped charges, or where the state couldn't proceed, or where the accused played trickery with good lawyers, no, the figure I'm about to share with you is only in instances where the police actually investigated the claim to such a length that they not only didn't find evidence sufficient to proceed with the allegation, but where they actually disproved the allegation, i.e. it could not have happened. The number is 19% in 2016 and 15% in 2017. If you include all those other categories where the police resources didn't permit them to actually exonerate the accused, but simply didn't proceed, Paul Elam's assertion of 40% is probably correct. Here https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/11-627-m/11-627-m2018024-eng.htm

So, did the assaults happen or not in the other 25% Koncorde (talk) 09:08, 25 November 2019 (UTC)

Updates to activities (white ribbon, conferences) and org structure.

Declaration of CoI: As noted above, I am David King, now AVfM's CIO. Amongst IT-related duties, I manage the LLC's financial accounts. Notwithstanding, I declare that receive no compensation from AVfM in any form.

I've just made two sets of edits to bring this article up-to-date. Said edits were reverted by User:Bbb23 without much apparent explanation other than minor protocol matters, though on subsequent follow-up they indicated that I should not be editing the article in the first place. Fine. Here's what needs changing.

Activities

• (3rd para) The article implies that whiteribbon.org has been in continuous ownership of AVfM since 2014. This is not the case. It was transferred to Erin Pizzey in November, 2014 (now over two years ago). Then, in June 2016, White Ribbon Australia filed a UDRP before WIPO (case D2016-1234). On 5 September 2016, WIPO decided against Ms Pizzey and the domain was subsequently transferred to White Ribbon Australia around 28 September.

Here's the citation for the WIPO case: "WIPO UDRP transfer decision". 5 September 2016.

• (4th para) Update text about the ICMI conference series. Something to the effect:

   A conference was planned for 2015 in Houston, TX but subsequently cancelled in May of that year.  A 2016 conference by the same name but not organised by AVfM was held in London, UK in July of that year.  As of late 2016, a 2017 conference is planned for Queensland, Australia.

Neither strike me as being particularly controversial edits. The WIPO citation is indisputably reliable, being an independent primary source and whatever I personally feel about the matter, I have stuck to the impartial facts. Per WP:PRIMARY, primary sources are not forbidden and I do not rely on it for analysis, only WIPO's finding of facts in support of the statement that AVfM did not own the domain for the past two years, and documentation of the transfer order to White Ribbon Australia.

I can't cite the cancellation of the 2015 conference because avoiceformen.com is blacklisted. I can provide references to ICMI '16 and '17 but, given my CoI, I don't want to be seen as shilling for the event. Input on that score welcome.

About

This section is very out of date and may now constitute a BLP violation because it imputes income to Paul Elam that I know for a fact he doesn't have.

The claim wrt income and number of employees is supported only by a 3rd hand, undated Dun & Bradstreet report itself cited by a BuzzFeed article written by Adam Serwer which features a caricature of Elam photoshopped onto the Westinghouse Rosie the Riveter poster in which Serwer makes clear his disdain for Elam. No reasonable person would consider that article remotely neutral and there is no particular reason to believe any claim he makes about AVfM or its finances.

I note User:Sonicyouth86's remarks about the alleged reliability of Serwer's article, but they give no reason why, even if BuzzFeed and D&B are RS in other contexts, that they are RS in this specific case given the evident animus Serwer exhibits toward Elam. Arguably, therefore, the Serwer article is in violation of WP:SOURCE and the whole passage should be removed unless a more reliable source can be found, and the D&B reference is in violation of WP:V because it cannot be independently verified.

I can say with certainty that the claim has never been true since the formation of AVfM Education, LLC in February of 2015. I am not privy to what happened prior to then, for which reason and in the interests of neutrality and giving the benefit of the doubt given my CoI, I proposed to put that passage into the past tense rather than remove it because I don't know that it has never been true.

In any event, the article gives a misleading impression of the financial situation of the organisation. I would like to clear that up because apart from being misleading, it is a common criticism that MRAs don't do anything in the real-world. MRAs say they/we don't have the money to do much in the real world and yet this article suggests otherwise contrary to fact. I'm trying to avoid the political element as much as possible and keep to NPOV, and as much for that reason as any other, I don't see that the public is well served by what I know (and what few others can know) to be misrepresentations about the organisation.

Anyway, here are the facts as they now stand:

Elam formed a Nevada LLC taxed as a C corporation in February, 2015 to separate his personal finances from those of the organisation. Short of the NV SoS entity record I don't know what other evidence could possibly establish this yet Bbb23 seemed to object to an external link. If the problem was just that it was inline rather than a reference, I wonder why they didn't just move it especially when they then say I should not make such edits nor, presumably corrections.

That LLC now receives all donation revenues, which the site no longer actively solicits (by way of donation drives). Though it still accepts donations, it now relies on membership-subscriptions and AdSense revenue all of which are paid to the LLC. Paul runs some 'informal' (ie not syndicated) ads which he may or may not personally benefit from. If he does, I am not privy to the arrangements. It is obvious enough that the organisation now is ad supported, but historically? I can supply a reference for the membership-subscription model but, again, avoiceformen.com is blacklisted.

Nobody draws a salary from the LLC, not even Paul. I should know, because I do the book-keeping (for what that's worth, since I can't independently prove it and nobody has any particular reason to believe me). He made a statement to that effect some time ago, but I can't link because avoiceformen.com is blacklisted.

Here's what I proposed to insert/change:

   The site also accepts donations, all of which went to Elam until February 2015 at which point Elam formed a Nevada-based LLC which now receives all revenues and is taxed as a C corporation.  As the LLC's manager, Elam still controls those revenues and says he uses the money to advance his cause. According to Dun & Bradstreet's database, AVFM had an estimated $120,000 in yearly revenue and one employee..  By Q1 2015, AVfM was ad-supported and Elam claimed not to draw any regular income from the LLC.  By July, 2015, AVfM began to use a membership-subscription revenue model.  The LLC still accepts donations.

— Strix ^t 16:09, 10 December 2016 (UTC)

Has this been resolved yet? The above raised a concern about the implication that Elam received an income from a particular source where the commenter said that was not the case. Now, almost a year later, the About section still implies that Paul Elam is paid by AVFM. Seems to me that is either the case or it isn't, but I don't think the cited Buzzfeed article is at all sufficient on its own to support the implication. Were this an actual bio article on Elam, I'd already have dealt with this out of WP:BLP concerns, but since the article is on AVFM and not Elam per se, I'll leave it as-is for discussion, for the time being. But we need better sourcing -- and it's going to need to be specific. If Elam is being paid, exactly how? Is it salary? Distributions? What? Things like AVFM paying his AVFM-related travel expenses doesn't necessarily (or even probably) count as him being paid. If the money is being spent on valid business expenses (usually tax deductible, but not always) then we cannot say or imply, on that basis alone, that Elam himself is being paid. An employee, officer, and even an owner is not the same "person" as the company to which they are connected. FWIW, I don't care about what the facts are here; I have no connection with anything being discussed, and as far as this comment is concerned I don't *care* about anything being discussed. But I do care about Wikipedia and that whatever facts it states *are* indeed facts. So pony up people -- sources, good ones, or the "with the exception of the founder" is getting cut. 2605:6000:F343:F300:78C4:159C:B19E:8F17 (talk) 18:44, 19 November 2017 (UTC)

References

Neutral Point of View - more than 50% of entry devoted to criticism

I flagged this for neutral point of view because over 50% of the text in the entry is devoted to criticism. This is very abnormal. The only reason I can see for devoting more text to criticism of the group than to other aspects of the group is because men's rights groups are unpopular and therefore entries about them are subjected to greater and more negative scrutiny. I think the criticism section should not be more than 50% of the entry. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 49.150.45.83 (talk) 16:04, 9 August 2017 (UTC)

I agree with both your observation and your suspicions. I'd fix its deficiencies but I would not be allowed to. Anybody connected with the org (including myself) has CoI, and few but AVfM's opponents have any interest in contributing to the article. No surprise that it's not as neutral as it could be.

If anybody would like some suggestions about how the article could be made more neutral, I can give a perspective from within the org and leave it up to others to decide if, how and where to use it. It's worth noting that anything positive (or even merely neutral) is likely to attract criticism of undeclared CoI. — Strix ^t 19:10, 10 August 2017 (UTC)

It begins, and ends, with reliable sources. Articles should reflect sources. If the majority of sources are critical, Wikipedia will reflect that without regard for artificial balance. If you know of any perspectives which are supported by reliable sources but are not in the article, let's see them. Grayfell (talk) 00:30, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

Articles don't have to be "neutral" about non-neutral subjects. NPOV= "All encyclopedic content on Wikipedia must be written from a neutral point of view (NPOV), which means representing fairly, proportionately, and, as far as possible, without editorial bias, all of the significant views that have been published by reliable sources on a topic." The significant volume of reliable sources are critical of AVfM, the article is therefore being NPOV by representing those sources "fairly, proportionately, and, as far as possible, without editorial bias". If there is a suggestion that credible reliable sources of an alternative POV exist that have been obscured by editing bias in the past then, as Grayfell said, "let's see them". Koncorde (talk) 11:22, 11 August 2017 (UTC)

This NPOV stuff is often a judgment call, and usually reasonable minds may differ. I think this is an example. That said, my own reasonable (I hope) mind is definitely tending in the direction of the concern expressed by the IP user who opened this comment. I ended up here as part of trying to figure out what the acronyms VFM and NCFM stood for in some article I was reading related to some of Jonathan Haidt's work, and yes my initial (uninformed but disinterested) reaction was that the criticism section is indeed too big in proportion to the article as a whole. (And note that at the time of writing, it is now under 50% of the article.) That said, I think the problem is less one of pure WP:NPOV and more one of the Undue Weight aspect of WP:RSUW. As that latter template says (bold emphasis mine), "Note that undue weight can be given in several ways, including, but not limited to, depth of detail, quantity of text...". On depth of detail, for example, notice that in the first seven sentences (comprising the first three paragraphs -- a total of around 340 words) only two (about 130 words, and some of those are overkill IMO) are actually criticisms of AVFM. Of the rest, they are either about the SPLC, the SPLC's IR report in general, or are some kind of softening of the criticisms. There's nothing vastly wrong with any of that, but the article's balance as a whole is, *I* think, suffering.

So here is a proposed alternative wording, pruned, as they say, like cherished roses (i.e. hard! :-) ). It takes the total length down from about 450 words to about 150 without, I think, losing anything valuable. In the early, Golden Age of Wikipedia, I'd have embraced WP:BOLD and just made these edits directly in the article itself. But since I'm talking to other reasonable (I hope) minds, let's be honest; those halcyon days are gone. Nowadays it's less WP:BOLD and more WP:BRRR and I reckon the following would last less than five minutes as an actual edit. But maybe here in Talk it will at least provoke some thoughts. (Note that I've deactivated the citations so as not to clutter up the bottom of the Talk page. But I've merely commented them out; they're all still in there and my intention is that they would be reactivated were any of this to be used in the article itself.)

Criticism AVFM has been criticized on several occasions by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC). In the spring 2012 issue ("The Year in Hate and Extremism") of their Intelligence Report, the SPLC included the AVFM's website ikn a list of twelve specifically identified as being misogynistic. A 2014 statement by the SPLC criticized the International Conference on Men’s Issues, run by AVFM Education, LLC, particularly finding fault with citations claiming that "40% to 50% of rape allegations are false". And in 2015, Mark Potok, then of the SPLC, wrote an article critical of the founder and leader of AVFM, Paul Elam. The organization has also been the subject of criticism in publications such as The New York Times and Time magazine , and it has been accused of using misogynistic and hateful rhetoric by several commentators, including Leah McLaren, Jaclyn Friedman, Brad Casey, and Clementine Ford,

I think there is still room for further improvement in terms of style, succinctness, and readability. For example, we really don't need that list of five commentators spelled out individually (although citing them all is fine). But again, reasonable minds..., so I've left that pretty much as it was (having moved Potok up into the SLPC paragraph). In its entirety, the above is just by way of suggestion (and probably worth no more than you paid for it). As to whether any of it should make its way into changes to the actual article itself, I will leave that decision to the rest of y'all. As a long-time, somewhat hard-bitten WP editor, in the context of that lost Golden Age of WP I mentioned, and to quote Danny Glover in Lethal Weapon, I'm getting too old for this sh*t. 70.112.157.39 (talk) 18:03, 19 November 2017 (UTC)

For Profit

I removed the part of the intro reading "for profit limited liability corporation" since the supporting evidence was a link to Buzzfeed. Buzzfeed is a dubious factual source and has been known to create sensational articles rather than articles which follow journalistic precedent. Oakstone123 (talk) 09:12, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

Since I pointed to this talk page as a reason for my revert, and have already typed a response, I am restoring this comment. While Buzzfeed does produce a lot of drivel, like many media organizations, they make a distinction between "editorial content" and journalism. Buzzfeed's journalism department is well-regarded in the industry, and is considered by Wikipedia to be a generally reliable source, per many past discussions. Grayfell (talk) 09:21, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

No worries, I just thought that this source was dubious and that it didn't contribute to the article in a neutral way. I removed this part of the talk page since I edited it without logging in, and then had to create a new account since I couldn't recover my previous username. Oakstone123 (talk) 09:27, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

Okay, fair enough. Wikipedia's talk pages are... peculiar, so these kinds of edit conflicts happen a lot. Grayfell (talk) 10:34, 11 December 2017 (UTC)

Diarrhea medicine

This is about this edit, and it's multiple reversions.

The source does support this point, but it is a single sentence contextualized it as part of the "red pill moment" jargon used by MRMs. Without that context, it's just a free-floating bit of weirdness, and even with that context, I'm not clear what it says about this organization. I'm fully aware of what it implies about the organization, but we shouldn't include things like this specifically because they are strange, or because they imply things we wish we could say, but can't. This is neither explained, nor emphasized, by the source, so it I don't think it belongs. Grayfell (talk) 06:51, 19 February 2018 (UTC)

Map & Table of ICMI Conferences

I have put together a map and table of ICMI conferences. A Voice for Men runs ICMI conferences either on its own or in conjunction with other organisations. As I am on staff at AVfM I will not add this to the page myself due to CoI. Robert Brockway (talk) 07:12, 2 January 2019 (UTC)